EU Targets Turkey In Next SEPA Expansion Wave
Hey Payments Fanatic!
The EU pitched to Turkey to join SEPA. A 41-country payments system designed to make euro transfers as fast and cheap as domestic ones.
The proposal came last month in Ankara. European Commissioner Marta Kos discussed it directly with Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan.
This has been building for a while. SEPA is already delivering scale across Europe and expanding into new candidate countries.
The numbers are clear. Up to €500 million in savings for smaller markets already in place. A single Turkey-Europe transfer today can cost up to €40.
As Jurgis Vilcinskas put it, SEPA could be “a valuable opportunity” to strengthen Turkey’s economic integration with the EU. And enable cross-border euro transfers to be as fast and cheap as domestic ones.
There is a trade-off. Turkish banks could lose fee revenue. And alignment with EU rules like PSD and AML would be required.
We’ve already seen companies like Solidgate building on top of SEPA rails to enable instant payments across Europe. I covered that here 👉: Solidgate Treasury Unlocks Instant SEPA Payments across Europe.
Europe and Turkey already move more than €200 billion in trade. This signals another step toward deeper financial integration.
We’re only scratching the surface here. More signals are coming your way next week.
Cheers,
INSIGHTS
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NEWS
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🇪🇺 The European Union has approved that Turkey join the Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) to improve economic integration and reduce the cost of cross-border euro payments. The move could deliver significant savings for businesses and consumers.
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🇬🇧 Bernie Miles has been named the Chief Data and Technology Officer of Tide’s C-suite. He will oversee the business’s push into a new AI-first business management platform approach. The appointment is part of Tide’s ambition to move from a financial services pure-play firm into a more holistic business service provider.
🇺🇸 Klarna Card reaches 5 million active customers. The card allows customers to spend from their own funds with the option to split payments when needed, supporting Klarna’s push to offer greater control over everyday spending. Keep reading
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🇺🇸 Western Alliance Bank taps Fiserv for Clover platform. As a result of the partnership, the West Coast-based bank will offer “scalable commerce capabilities” to its clients that demand reliability, performance, and growth at scale, says Chris Foskett, vice chairman of Fiserv.
GOLDEN NUGGET
Wero 🆚 Pay by Bank
🇪🇺 Europe’s payments future is splitting in two:
Europe is pushing hard toward account-to-account payments.
But under the surface, two very different models are emerging: 𝗪𝗲𝗿𝗼 and 𝗣𝗮𝘆 𝗯𝘆 𝗕𝗮𝗻𝗸.
They may look similar. They are not.
𝗪𝗲𝗿𝗼 is building a consumer wallet + scheme.
A new layer on top of bank accounts, with its own rules, branding, and ecosystem.
Think:
• A European alternative to card networks
• A shared wallet experience
• Scheme governance, fees, and participation rules
It’s about control and sovereignty at the scheme level
𝗣𝗮𝘆 𝗯𝘆 𝗕𝗮𝗻𝗸 is pure Open Banking infrastructure.
No wallet.
No new consumer layer.
No scheme.
Just direct bank connectivity embedded inside existing apps.
Think:
• API-driven payments
• Native checkout integrations
• PSD2-based authentication
• No intermediaries between user and bank
It’s about removing layers, not adding them
The real difference: where the power sits.
𝗪𝗲𝗿𝗼 sits on top of the user experience.
𝗣𝗮𝘆 𝗯𝘆 𝗕𝗮𝗻𝗸 sits underneath it.
That changes everything:
• Who owns the customer relationship
• Who controls the data
• How flexible your product can be
• How you scale across Europe
The trade-off
𝗪𝗲𝗿𝗼:
👉 Strong European 🇪🇺 brand
👉 Unified experience:
– Scheme fees
– New dependency layer
𝗣𝗮𝘆 𝗯𝘆 𝗕𝗮𝗻𝗸:
👉 Lower costs
👉 No chargebacks
👉 Full control + flexibility:
– No unified front-end experience
What this means for fintechs
This isn’t just a payment method decision.
It’s an architecture decision.
Are you building on top of a new scheme…
Or plugging directly into the rails?
Europe isn’t choosing one path.
It’s building both.
And that’s where things get interesting.
I highly recommend reading the complete source article on this topic by IBANXS for more info.
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